The symphony, declared Paul Bekker in 1918, is by definition a ‘public genre’. But in the wake of the First World War and the revolutions and economic turbulence that it triggered, the potential ‘community building force’ that Bekker identified in the symphony seems to have gone largely unnoticed as the genre itself fell into disregard among the younger generation of composers.
Things changed in the 1930s, however, when statistics suggest that the symphony experienced a revival across Europe and the West, apparently oblivious to the political divides that were emerging, whether in the USSR, Nazi Germany, or in the democracies of Britain, the ‘New Deal’ USA, France, Switzerland or Scandinavia. The increasing popularity of the radio also provided the means for this monumental genre to reach unprecedentedly broad audiences.
Symphonic production seems to have reached a peak around 1945, though the genre remained popular thereafter, even during the years when the radio stations and summer courses of post-War Europe seemed determined to uphold a post-Webernian aesthetic. The symphonies of the interwar years and the mid-20th century – their composition, dissemination and reception - have recently become a topic of scholarly interest (see Emil MacGregor and the forthcoming Cambridge Companion to British Symphonies). But if the symphony remained a public genre, what publics did it now address? If it indeed possessed ‘community building’ potential, what communities did it help to build or demarcate, and what technologies played a role in promoting it? And what role did the symphony play outside Europe and the USA – in Latin America, Africa and Australasia?
26 June 2026 - Université de Genève, Switzerland
On 26 June 2026, the Unité de musicologie of Geneva University is holding a Study Day on ‘The Symphony and its Publics, 1918–1968’. Scholars and students are encouraged to submit proposals either for individual papers (20 minutes) or for the final 2-hours analysis panel (10–15 minutes of analytical presentation per person, followed by a response and discussion).
Papers may focus, for example, on sociological, political or transdisciplinary issues, analysis, reception history, performance history, the technology of musical dissemination or mass media.
For those who would like to take part in the final analysis session, please also include the piece you would like to analyse in the document.
This Study Day is being held in collaboration with the SNSF project ‘Helvetia through a Twelve-Note Lens’ at the Bern Academy of the Arts (HKB).
Proposals should include a title, an abstract of up to 250 words, plus the speaker’s name, institutional affiliation and educational status where appropriate (e.g. doctoral student, postdoc). Please submit no later than 20 April 2026 to Chuyu Zhang at chuyu.zhang(at)etu.unige.ch
Official languages of the Study Day: English and French.
Keynote speaker
- Dr Ben Earle (University of Birmingham)
- Title: The Nazi Symphony
Scientific committee
- Nicolas Donin (UniGE)
- Anna Stoll-Knecht (UniFR)
- Chris Walton (HKB/FHNW)
- Ben Earle (Bham)
- Chuyu Zhang (HKB/UniGE)
Organisation committee
- Unité de musicologie (UniGe)
- Institut Interpretation (HKB)